DEMOCRATS ARE TO BLAME - RUSSIA WAS ALL BUT IGNORED BY OBAMA ON TREATY MATTERS!

WASHINGTON — Russia has secretly deployed a new cruise missile
despite complaints from American officials that it violates a landmark
arms control treaty that helped seal the end of the Cold War,
administration officials say.
The move presents a major challenge for President Trump, who has
vowed to improve relations with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia
and to pursue future arms accords.
The new Russian missile deployment also comes as the Trump
administration is struggling to fill key policy positions at the State
Department and the Pentagon — and to settle on a permanent replacement
for
Michael T. Flynn, the national security adviser
who resigned late Monday.
Mr. Flynn stepped down after it was revealed that he had misled the
vice president and other officials over conversations with Moscow’s
ambassador to Washington.
The ground-launched cruise missile at the center of American concerns is one that the Obama administration said in 2014
had been tested in violation of a 1987 treaty that bans American and Russian intermediate-range missiles based
on land.
The Obama administration had sought to persuade the Russians to
correct the violation while the missile was still in the test phase.
Instead, the Russians have moved ahead with the system, deploying a
fully operational unit.
Administration officials said the Russians now have two battalions of
the prohibited cruise missile. One is still located at Russia’s missile
test site at Kapustin Yar in the country’s southeast.
The other was shifted in December from that test site to an
operational base elsewhere in the country, according to a senior
official who did not provide further details and requested anonymity to
discuss recent intelligence reports about the missile.
American officials had called the cruise missile the SSC-X-8. But the
“X” has been removed from current intelligence reports, indicating that
American intelligence officials consider the missile to be operational
and no longer a system in development.
The Russia missile program has been a major concern for the Pentagon,
which has developed options for how to respond, including deploying
additional missile defenses in Europe or developing air-based or
sea-based cruise missiles.
But it is politically significant, as well.
It is very unlikely that the Senate, which is already skeptical of
Mr. Putin’s intentions, would agree to ratify a new strategic arms
control accord unless the alleged violation of the intermediate-range
treaty is corrected. Mr. Trump has said the United
States should “strengthen and expand its nuclear capability.” But at
the same time, he has talked of reaching a new arms agreement with
Moscow that would reduce arms “very substantially.”
The deployment of the system could also increase the military threat
to NATO nations, which potentially would be one of the principal
targets. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is scheduled to meet with allied
defense ministers in Brussels on Wednesday.
Before he left his post last year as the NATO commander and retired
from the military, Gen. Philip M. Breedlove warned that deployment of
the cruise missile would be a militarily significant development that
“can’t go unanswered.”
Coming up with an arms control solution would not be easy.
Each missile battalion is believed to have four mobile launchers and a
larger supply of missiles. The launcher for the cruise missile,
however, closely resembles the launcher used for the Iskander, a
nuclear-tipped short-range system that is permitted under
treaties.
“This will make location and verification really tough,” General Breedlove said in an interview.